DENGUE has struck again, despite the cooler weather, this time flooring 17 people in the East Coast area - 13 of them are construction workers from a worksite in Telok Kurau, and the remaining four are residents who live close by.

All of them are believed to have recovered.

But no breeding of the Aedes aegypti, which spreads dengue, was detected at the site itself. But owners of three homes were fined for breeding, according to the National Environment Agency (NEA).

The construction site has also been ordered to spruce up conditions as a preventive measure.

This is the second construction site with more than 10 cases this year, and the first significantly large cluster since Bukit Batok found itself dengue-riddled for almost three months earlier this year, with 117 cases reported, making it the largest cluster in recent years.

More than 8,600 cases have been reported this year, with eight deaths. The outbreak reached epidemic levels in July when more than 400 people fell ill.

That is significantly higher than last year's 3,126 cases, but still lower than the last major outbreak in 2005, when the disease hit 14,209 people and killed 25.

The escalating dengue problem could, in part, be blamed on climate change, according to the World Health Organisation.

Speaking on the sidelines of the United Nations climate change conference in Bali last week, director WHO's Public Health and Environment programme, Maria Neira had pointed to Singapore's rising temperatures as a possible cause.

The mean annual temperature has gone up from 26.9 degree Celsius in 1978 to 28.4 degree Celsius in 1998, she said, and at the same time, cases of dengue have increased more than ten-fold - 384 in 1978 to 5,258 in 1998.